In recent years, grid computing (to be also simply referred to as “grid” hereinafter) has received a great deal of attention, which makes a plurality of computers connected through a network available as if they were a single system. Attempts to apply it to various fields have been made.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram for explaining the architecture of grid computing. There exist several kinds of grids. One called a desktop grid will be explained here, which executes a job by using the vacant time of the CPU of, e.g., a desktop PC.
Referring to FIG. 1, a client 10 is a device to which a user inputs a job as a request. The input job is transferred to a task manager (to be abbreviated as TM hereinafter) 20. The TM 20 transmits the contents of the job to a dynamic job scheduler (to be abbreviated as DJS hereinafter) 30.
The DJS 30 manages the resources of all of a plurality of host devices 41 to 43 each of which includes a broker 411 and resource manager (to be abbreviated as RM hereinafter) 412 and is recognized as a resource. The DJS 30 analyzes the job, selects the broker 411 of an optimum resource, and notifies the TM 20 of it. “Resource” means the vacant state of an available CPU.
The broker 411 registers, in the DJS 30, resource information acquired by the RM 412 and inputs the job to an optimum resource in accordance with the request from the TM 20. When the job is finished, the broker 411 notifies the TM 20 of the completion of the job.
The TM 20 inputs the job to the optimum broker 411 selected by the DJS 30 and monitors the state of progress of the job. Upon receiving the completion notification from the broker 411, the TM 20 notifies the client 10 of the result. When a change or error (e.g., a failure or reception of another job) has occurred in the resource, the RM 412 notifies the broker 411 of it.
With this mechanism, a job is distributed to a resource such as a CPU which is normally unused so that distributed processing can be executed by a plurality of devices without making the user conscious. Hence, desktop grid computing is implemented.
Scientific research has extensively been done for implementing high-speed processing by collecting the CPU powers of computers using the above-described grid computing technologies. However, application of grid computing to an incorporated device such as MFP (Multi Function Peripheral) called a multifunction apparatus or SFP (Single Function Peripheral) has not been implemented yet.
For example, when this technology is applied to an image forming system including MFP connected to an office LAN, PCs, server, and MFP on the LAN are used as resources to be subjected to distributed processing.
When a job is divided and distributed in this arrangement, the job cannot finish until the distributed processes in all devices are finished. If the user of the terminal of a client requests another job processing (local job processing), this processing is preferentially done. Since the above-described distributed job can be stopped any time at the discretion of each client, processing takes a longer time after all.